Code Of Silence: Trailer, certificate and where to watch
Crime and communication collide when a plucky lipreader gets in too deep
Year: 2025
Certificate: 12
The former EastEnders actress and Strictly winner Rose Ayling-Ellis ups her dramatic game in this crime thriller. It's cops and robbers with a twist as deaf canteen worker Alison (Ayling-Ellis) is plucked from obscurity to help with a high-stakes investigation.
Police are trying to catch a dangerous gang of robbers, but they're a savvy bunch who know to plan their next heist outside where listening devices can't be planted. The police use lipreaders for surveillance in situations such as this and, with their usual lipreader out of the picture, Alison is hastily recruited by Ghosts' Charlotte Ritchie's detective.
There's a clever visual representation of how Alison reads lips: Speech appears on the screen, a bit jumbled first, before Alison deciphers it into a meaningful sentence: 'With lip reading it's not just about seeing words,' she says. 'It's who's talking and what you know of them.' She finds it all thrilling, and who could blame her? It beats washing pans for a living.
Her enthusiasm to do a good job leads Alison into trouble when she gets close to the handsome new gang member, a hacker called Liam (Kieron Moore). His codename is Hoodie and the other gang members have equally cool names. There's Hulk, Wolf and leader Cruella - taking over from her husband who was banged up by the senior officer on the case (Andrew Buchan, Broadchurch).
All in all, it's a nimble game of cat and mouse, with Rose an engaging lead as the plucky - if naive - Alison. (Six episodes)
